HP ZBook x2

Pros

Workstation-certified graphics.

4K screen is standard.

32GB of RAM.

Cons

Bulkier than other detachables.

Bottom Line

With workstation-grade components, the HP ZBook x2 packs more power than most detachable-hybrid 2-in-1 laptops.
It's a good fit for for artists, 4K videographers, and anyone who needs massive power in a versatile form factor.

March 16, 2018

With its powerful components and robust feature set, the HP ZBook x2 (starts at $2,279; $3,500 as tested) has its sights set on a small subset of photographers and artists who are contemplating abandoning a desktop or laptop as a primary creative tool. If you fall into that category, HP makes it easy to consider making that leap, with this detachable Windows tablet offering a quad-core processor, copious RAM, a discrete GPU, a 4K display, and unique physical buttons. On the other hand, its unwieldy weight and average computing performance compared with its competitors mean the ZBook x2 is more of an intriguing, albeit pricey, alternative to existing tools, not a revolution in digital art creation.

Sleek, but Not Svelte

The Zbook x2 is a unique fusion of a mobile workstation (discrete graphics, lots of memory) and a detachable tablet (you can interact with it using just the touch screen after taking off the wireless keyboard). This fusion itself isn't new; Microsoft uses it to great success with the Surface Pro and the Surface Book, pioneers of the category that have inspired many imitators, such as the Dell Latitude 5285 2-in-1. The key traits that most of these Surface-like devices share are slim dimensions and minimal weight. After all, you have to be able to hold them in your hands to use them as true tablets. The Surface Pro weighs just 1.75 pounds without its keyboard cover, for instance.

The reason the ZBook x2 is unique even among this bunch is because it is comparatively not portable. Our review unit weighs 3.7 pounds by itself and 4.9 pounds with the keyboard cover attached. That's not heavy by gaming laptop or mobile workstation standards (HP's own conventional workstation Zbook 15 G4 weighs 5.8 pounds, for instance) but it feels like a ton of bricks if you're used to casually carrying around a tablet with one hand.

The tablet measures 0.57 by 14.35 by 8.94 inches (HWD) by itself, with the keyboard cover adding 0.23-inch to the height. It's an impressive engineering feat, considering everything the ZBook x2 packs inside, but it's still much bigger than the Surface Pro, which measures 0.33 by 11.5 by 7.9, or the 0.38-by-11.5-by-8.2 Dell Latitude 5285.

The only comparable device that comes close to the weight and form factor of the ZBook x2 is Wacom's MobileStudio Pro, offered in either 13-inch or 15-inch sizes. The larger model carries a similarly eye-watering price as the ZBook x2, largely serves the same purpose as a tool for graphic design, and weighs about the same at 4.9 pounds.

The impressive array of components and materials that HP manages to fit inside the ZBook x2 is responsible for all this weight. To start, there's a CNC-milled aluminum cover that feels very premium and exceptionally solid. There are no visible screws anywhere on the tablet, not even on the hinges that hold the kickstand for propping it up at virtually any angle on a table to use as a laptop or a drawing easel. There's an extra-wide border around the screen, or bezel, that accommodates not only front- and rear-facing cameras, but also IR sensors for face recognition and two sets of identical function buttons that are designed to replace keyboard shortcuts when you're using an app from the Adobe Creative Suite or similar software with the keyboard detached.

The 14-inch, 4K (3,840 by 2,160) touch panel has a matte anti-glare finish, and an integrated electro-magnetic resonance (EMR) layer from Wacom, which works similarly to the MobileStudio Pro's screen. HP offers the Wacom pen as a $66 accessory. With the pen, you get 4,000 sensitivity levels, left- and right-click functions, and an eraser all without a battery, since it derives its power wirelessly from the EMR layer. Compare that with the much shallower (and thus lighter) screen components in the Surface Pro and the Surface Book, which work with Microsoft's battery-powered Surface Pen.

Around back, in addition to the sturdy kickstand, exhaust and air-intake vents occupy the top edge and half of the left and right edges, necessary to provide cooling for the quad-core Intel Core i7 CPU and Nvidia Quadro graphics card. And even though the ZBook x2's form factor is intended to be portable, the tablet includes every port you need to plug in once you get back to your desk. It's not quite the complement you'd expect to find on a true mobile workstation, but it's close. The right edge hosts two USB-C connectors with Thunderbolt 3 support, a dedicated power jack, a USB 3.0 port, and even a full-size HDMI connector and an SD card slot. The left edge has a 3.5mm headphone jack, a lock slot, and volume and power controls.

The excellent keyboard and touchpad are nearly identical to the ones you'll find on the ZBook 15 G4. They're even more impressive when you consider that they fit into a cover that's less than half of an inch thick. The keys are solid, the deck is extremely sturdy, and the clickable touchpad is generously sized and very responsive thanks in part to its glass construction. The rear of the cover is soft to the touch and the textured bottom prevents the tablet from sliding around on your desk while you're using it in Laptop mode.

Sound from the stereo speakers is passable, though no more faithful or voluminous than much slimmer tablets, including the Apple iPad Pro.You'll want to connect to an external Bluetooth or wired speaker for better audio. In addition to Bluetooth, there's also 802.11ac Wi-Fi, but no option for a SIM card to get LTE connectivity on the go.

To top it all off, the ZBook x2 is designed to withstand harsh conditions like water, sand, dust, and shocks described in the MIL-STD-810G standard. Note that, rather frustratingly, HP requires you to buy accidental damage protection if you want the company to fix water, sand, dust, or shock damage, just like you would for your non-ruggedized smartphone. That's akin to saying, "We're not responsible if you encounter damage under the harsh conditions we designed our product to withstand unless you pay extra." A one-year parts and labor warranty is included.

Function Buttons, x2

The ZBook x2's feature list is impressive, and it's among the most specialized we've recently seen on a laptop or tablet. The most novel features, such as the 4K Wacom-enabled touchscreen and dedicated function buttons, will be most useful if they can improve upon the tools that you currently use, instead of merely replacing them.

To see if that's likely, you'll want to compare it not only with the Wacom MobileStudio Pro, but also peripheral drawing devices like the Wacom Intuos Pro that can be paired with a conventional desktop or laptop. If you use something like the Intuos Pro, which lets you draw on paper and then transfer those drawings to your PC or Mac, you'll already have a good idea of the benefits and drawbacks and how it affects your workflow. If you don't use it, you can check out some thoughts from one of PCMag's in-house designers in our full review. Meanwhile, you can see what our in-house digital artist has to say about the efficacy of the MobileStudio Pro in our review of that tablet.

To complete the comparison, consider that the ZBook x2 has two identical sets of function buttons instead of the MobileStudio Pro's one set. HP has also put a lot of thought into how they could be used with Adobe apps, even including presets for common toolbar functions in a pre-installed app. On the other hand, the Wacom technology in the HP isn't quite as advanced as what you'll find in Wacom's own devices. For instance, the HP pen only has half of the MobileStudio Pro's 8,192 levels of pressure sensitivity, and while the display does feel paper-like to draw on, the Intuos Pro digitizes what you draw on actual paper.

Don't Forget, It's Also a Computer

Of course, you also need to consider how the tablet functions as an actual computer. As its price suggests, the ZBook x2 is packed with high-end components. Most notable is the 32GB of RAM in our review unit, which is the same as you'll find in the ZBook 15 G4, but double the memory limit that most other tablets and convertibles offer. The Surface Pro, the Surface Book, and the MobileStudio Pro all top out at 16GB.

Several processor and storage options are available, with our ZBook x2 packing an Intel Core i7-8650U. The U designation means that this is a low-powered chip designed to prioritize energy savings, and it's an unfortunate but likely necessary compromise to keep the ZBook x2 from overheating or chewing through its battery life in an hour or so. Still, everyday computing performance matches the Microsoft Surface Book 2 and Surface Pro, with each of the three machines scoring just above 3,000 on the PCMark 8 test. That means there's more than enough power for web browsing, videoconferencing, and the like.

On specialized multimedia tasks like image editing, 3D rendering, and video encoding, the ZBook x2 finished in the middle of the pack. For instance, it rendered a short 1080p video in 1 minute, 24 seconds using Handbrake, compared with more than 2 minutes for the Latitude 5285, but less than a minute for the ZBook 15 G4.

Perhaps the most puzzling part of the ZBook G4's component list is the Nvidia Quadro M620 GPU, with 2GB of dedicated memory. On the one hand, it's installed in the tablet itself, rather than Microsoft's approach of installing the GPU in the keyboard base. That means your graphics performance doesn't suffer when you're using the machine in Tablet mode. On the other hand, the Surface Book 2 includes a far more powerful Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060, which trounces the ZBook x2 on our gaming benchmark tests at 1080p resolution, producing more than 50 frames per second (fps) compared with the 18fps of the ZBook x2.

For some users, this is the worst possible discrete GPU scenario, in that you get mediocre performance all of the time. Putting a meatier card in the keyboard gives you more power in Laptop mode (when you're most likely to be rendering 3D animations or video), and less weight when you're in Tablet mode and don't need tons of performance. Or you might simply enjoy the rare opportunity to use a discrete GPU in a tablet.

The battery, undoubtedly hindered by powering the HP's bright 4K display, managed a very short 5 hours, 6 minutes on our rundown test. That's a poor showing compared with the competition, each of which lasted for more than 10 hours, and abysmal next to the 17 hours, 12 minutes that the Surface Book 2 accomplished.

Good for Your Workflow?

If you're a photographer or graphic designer looking to liberate yourself from a traditional laptop or desktop without giving up computing power, the ability to sketch with a pen, or efficient workflows for the Adobe suite and other similar apps, then the HP ZBook x2 is worth a hard look. As well-crafted as it is, though, it's not the only option. The Surface Pro and the Surface Book offer similar computing performance and form factors, while Wacom's MobileStudio Pro and Intuos Pro offer equivalent avenues for creative expression.

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About the Author

Joel Santo Domingo is the Lead Analyst for the Desktops team at PC Magazine Labs. He joined PC Magazine in 2000, after 7 years of IT work for companies large and small. His background includes managing mobile, desktop and network infrastructure on both the Macintosh and Windows platforms. Joel is proof that you can escape the retail grind: he wore a yellow polo shirt early in his tech career. Along the way Joel earned a BA in English Literature and an MBA in Information Technology from Rutgers University. He is responsible for overseeing PC Labs testing, as well as formulating new test methodologies for the PC Hardware team. Along with … See Full Bio